pwr_january-2025 - 21

DISTRIBUTED ENERGY RESOURCES
DERs, " said Matthew Wolfe, director and
vice president of Business Development
at Icetec, an energy management company
that works with microgrids, energy
storage, and more. " At the utility level,
they should ease the interconnection
process for DERs that reduce load during
peak times. Right now, many DERs, like
batteries, are studied as if they are load
increasers during peak times, rather than
load reducers, which makes no sense.
Ideally, there would be a set of conditions,
and if a DER meets those conditions,
then interconnection is a simple,
predictable process. For example, if a
site could guarantee that it never imports
more power than it historically has, and
won't charge during peak times, then interconnection
should be streamlined. "
Wolfe told POWER: " Likewise, utilities
should structure rates to encourage
dispatch of DERs during peak times,
helping to reduce costly transmission
and distribution infrastructure costs. An
example of this is in Massachusetts,
where the DPU [Department of Public
Utilities] recently required the two main
investor-owned utilities [Eversource and
National Grid] to allow customers to opt
into a Coincident Peak Transmission Demand
charge. This means that, if a DER
dispatches during the system peak, it
can eliminate or reduce transmission
demand charges. In Eversource territory,
this is worth upward of $17,000 per MW
per month. "
Brian Nelson, head of Renewables at
ABB, said, " Government policies that will
support future growth in DERs include
regulations like net metering, which incentivizes
solar installations and energy
storage. Recent iterations in California's
net metering rules have shifted focus toward
coupling energy storage with solar
to improve grid reliability.
" Additionally, permitting processes
need improvement to facilitate project
deployment. Federal initiatives like the
Inflation Reduction Act and FERC [Federal
Energy
Regulatory
Commission]
orders 1920 and 2222 are essential for
funding and supporting DER integration, "
said Nelson. " Tax credits at both federal
and state levels can encourage investments
in renewable technologies, making
it financially viable for consumers and
businesses to adopt DER solutions. "
Maksim Sonin, a fellow at Stanford
University in the Precourt Institute for
Energy, told POWER: " While DERs appear
to offer a compelling way forward
to ensure energy availability, independence,
and supply flexibility, they come
January 2025 | POWER
2. Vehicle-to-grid technology allows electric vehicles to send power back to the grid. The innovation
supports stability of the grid, one of the important aspects of distributed energy resources
(DERs). Courtesy: Raysonho @ Open Grid Scheduler / Scalable Grid Engine
with higher installation costs compared
to utility-scale facilities. This makes DERs
heavily reliant on incentives and tax credits:
Investment Tax Credit, Production Tax
Credit, and others. Thus, regulatory support
measures will remain a key driver of
the pace at which DERs deployment and
integration progress. "
Technology Advancements
Strategies to deploy DERs are supported
by technical innovation, as companies
launch systems for real-time
monitoring and data acquisition that
enable more efficient management of
power supply and demand.
Rohan Kelkar, executive vice president
of Power Products at Schneider Electric
Energy & Sustainability Services,
told POWER: " As the energy landscape
evolves, the future of distributed energy
and the resilience of our overall grid increasingly
depend on bi-directional energy
flow. Solutions such as virtual power
plants, microgrids, and vehicle-to-grid
[V2G] technology [Figure 2] are transforming
the landscape, signaling a shift
away from traditional, one-way energy
systems. This transition presents significant
challenges for electric utilities,
which are finding their dominance being
tested by a new force: prosumers and
decentralized energy resources that are
rapidly changing the game. "
Kelkar noted that while technology will
drive the design of DER systems, there
needs to be an emphasis on their benefits
to bring wider adoption. " The challenge
we face is not just technical but
commercial as well. To thrive in this new
environment, we must harness these
changes to benefit all stakeholders, "
said Kelkar. " This is where artificial intelligence
[AI] and the on-site installation
of DERs become pivotal. In a way, we
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have too much data and too little insight.
So, managing this data effectively-both
technically
and
operationally-is
vital
as some grid systems may struggle to
adapt, creating both challenges and opportunities
for improvement. "
Said Kelkar, " More recently, we
continue to explore the power of DC
[direct-current] microgrids, which can
be well-suited for modern energy demands
and hold the potential to maximize
efficiency and integrate on-site
resources like rooftop solar and battery
storage. Our current reality requires us
to rethink our approach-can we design
systems that use less power and
dynamically manage consumption? Energy
efficiency must once again take
center stage as a crucial element in our
decarbonization efforts. "
McLaughlin told POWER: " FERC Order
No. 2222's main goal is to better enable
DERs to participate in the electricity
markets run by regional grid operators. In
order to enable many small DERs to participate
in electricity markets that have
a lot of rules and requirements, FERC is
reducing barriers to the participation of
DER aggregations. "
McLaughlin said, " Individually, small
DERs might not be large enough to participate
in regional electricity markets.
Grid operators need aggregations to be
of sufficient size in order to efficiently
manage the market and the electric
grid and not overburden their systems.
When combined into an aggregation, the
output and activity of several or many
DERs can satisfy minimum size and performance
requirements for participation
established by the RTO [regional transmission
organization].
" At the state level, utility incentive
programs have led to growth in DER
programs like solar rebate programs and
21

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